Henrik Dvergsdal wrote:
> 6. It will make the text of the standard more accessible, at least for
> "competent" developers. When you get used to the formal syntax it is
> much easier to read than the prose.
FWIW, by this definition I am not a "competent" developer (I do not find formal
syntax easier to read than prose). Nevertheless I was able to make a significant
contribution to html5lib because the parsing algorithm (which is different to
the conformance requirements, but nevertheless illustrative) is written in
English prose. When implementing the library we were able to report and resolve
some ambiguities in the spec; I would expect other implementations to find other
issues leading to further clarification. I would suggest this experience alone
highlights two points in favour of English prose:
1) It is accessible to those without a background in computer science. This
probably includes the majority of web developers. There is little point in
making document conformance requirements in a language that is not spoken by
those looking to produce documents.
2) It encourages multiple, /independent/ implementations of the specification,
allowing ambiguities in the text to be quickly resolved. An official schema is
also likely to contain bugs (compared to the intent of the WG coming from the
English prose discussion to schema translation) but they are less likely to be
noticed as people will use the schema as-is.
--
"Eternity's a terrible thought. I mean, where's it all going to end?"
-- Tom Stoppard, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead